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Introduction
Univ.-Prof. Dr. Derek Remeš, born in 1986 in the USA, is Professor of Music Theory at the Technical University in Dortmund, Germany. Previously he was Docent for Music Theory at the Lucerne University of Applied Arts and Sciences in Switzerland. He holds a PhD in Music Theory from the Freiburg University of Music in Germany, where he completed a dissertation in 2020 on J. S. Bach’s compositional pedagogy (summa cum laude), which won the Society for Music Theory’s dissertation award. Mr. Remeš ha
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Publications (25)
Largely because of the proselytizing efforts of J. P. Kirnberger, J. S. Bach’s four-part vocal chorales ( Choralgesänge ) have come to be viewed as idealized microcosms of Baroque composition. For this reason, the Choralgesänge have enjoyed pride of place in compositional instruction for over two centuries. Yet recent archival discoveries have begu...
If Johann Sebastian Bach has loomed extra-large in the imagination of scholars, performers, and audiences since the late nineteenth century, this volume sets out to provocatively reshape that imagination from a multitude of present-day perspectives, both from within and outside of traditional Bach studies. The essays gathered here reconsider Bach’s...
Jakob Adlung’s recently rediscovered manuscript treatise, ‘Anweisung zum Fantasiren’ (‘Instruction in improvisation’, c.1725–7), proves definitively that some 18th-century musicians understood improvisation modularly in terms of stock voice-leading patterns, or schemas. The manuscript is a compendium containing 28 typical voice-leading patterns tha...
Until now, scholars have generally doubted whether Johann Kuhnau, J. S. Bach’s predecessor as Thomaskantor in Leipzig, was indeed the author of the manuscript treatise, Fundamenta Compositionis Jean Kuhnaus 1703. Nevertheless the Fundamenta appears to originate from the Thomasschule around 1700, suggesting that it may stem from Kuhnau’s broader cir...
Bis zum heutigen Tag bestehen Zweifel, ob Johann Kuhnau, Vorgänger Johann Sebastian Bachs im Amt des Leipziger Thomaskantors, tatsächlich als Autor der handschriftlich überlieferten Fundamenta Compositionis Jean Kuhnaus 1703 angesehen werden kann. Dennoch sprechen verschiedene Umstände dafür, die Entstehung des Manuskripts in die Zeit um 1700 und i...
This article provides the first English translation of a little-known manuscript treatise by the central-German composer and Capellmeister, Gottfried Heinrich Stölzel (1690–1749), titled Kürzer und gründliche Unterricht (Brief and Thorough Instruction, ca. 1719–49). Stölzel’s method frames speculative theory ( trias harmonica and the tabula traditi...
In 2010, researchers at the Bach-Archiv Leipzig rediscovered a manuscript treatise by the central German organist and theorist Jacob Adlung titled “Anweisung zum Fantasieren” (Instruction in Improvisation), dating from c. 1726–27. The treatise, which is investigated here for the first time in print, contains twenty-eight typical baroque voice-leadi...
In attempting to determine how Johann Sebastian Bach taught composition, this article draws on recent archival discoveries to claim that it was not the ornamented, vocal Choralgesänge, but the simpler, thoroughbass-centered Choralbuch style that played a central role in Bach’s pedagogy. Fascinatingly, many newly-rediscovered chorale books from Bach...
Johann David Heinichen's treatise Der General-Bass in der Composition (Dresden, 1728) is the most comprehensive study of thoroughbass ever written, yet it has been continually overshadowed in historical accounts by works published in the same decade by Jean-Philippe Rameau ( Traité de l'Harmonie ) and J. J. Fux ( Gradus ad Parnassum ). Despite Hein...
ANWEISUNG ZUM FANTASIEREN: SYMPOSIUM ZUR PRAXIS UND THEORIE DER IMPROVISATION IM 17. UND 18. JAHRHUNDERT SCHOLA CANTORUM BASILIENSIS, 19–21 MARCH 2018 - Volume 16 Issue 1 - DEREK REMEŠ
Recently discovered chorale books from J. S. Bach's circle of pupils have prompted a re-evaluation of long-held assumptions regarding the function of the chorale in Bach's pedagogy. These sources, together with documents from Bach's pupils and grand-pupils, show that the keyboard chorale, not the vocal chorale, played the central role. This keyboar...
This article proposes a historically informed method for introducing today's students to figured-bass practice in J. S. Bach's circle. Rather than using Bach's vocal chorales, as is common today, this method imitates Bach's pedagogy by using figured-bass keyboard chorales. C. P. E. Bach's Neue Melodien (1787) are used within a series of six increas...
